


The Ballad of John Silver

by layaandchloe



Category: Black Sails
Genre: Black Sails - Freeform, M/M, References to Depression, divergence in canon, first chapter flint second is billy x silver
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-01-24
Updated: 2018-01-31
Packaged: 2019-03-08 20:31:05
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,031
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13465983
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/layaandchloe/pseuds/layaandchloe
Summary: A bleak future in which Billy Bones slits Madi's throat and Thomas dies at his father's hand. Flint has his war and Silver has to live with the consequences.Second Chapter is John and Billy





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> There are so few fics about this pairing so I decided to write my own :)

Silver's gaze caught on him. It was always him. The untold possibility that lay in those razor blue eyes as he stared across empty miles of open ocean, studying the tempest that writhed with violent promise in the distance. He had often thought about the toll it must take on him, the duality of a man like him. How a man capable of such great compassion and strength could twist himself into a savage of the seas, a hellish villain in civilization's callus eyes. There was nothing Flint wouldn't do for his war, nothing Flint couldn't do. He had moved the intangible into reality for his revenge, crafted armies out of nothing but Nassau's greed and chaos to rally for his cause. Triumphed over Nature herself, blazing through unbridled storms and feverish famine and drought. If he were a religious man, Silver might have compared him to the Old Testament God, just and brutal.   
  
He looked the part now, wind ruffling his ginger hair while he stared down the brewing storm in the horizon. Lighting writhing in the distance, casting shadows over Flint's steely face.  
  
As if sensing his state, Flint turned. Their gazes caught from across the deck and Silver started down slick steps, pretending as if he too, had only been studying horizon. Men scurried around him like insects before a flood as he limped his way to the opposing side of the ship. No one touched him or brushed against him despite the fervor in the air. Weathered eyes may have trailed him across the deck but no smiles or words of consolation were offered as he limped to where Flint stood. He made no effort to change that.   
  
Flint's back was turned to him as Silver settled against the familiar wooden railing adjacent to the other man. Flint faced the storm directly, fingers painted white as he gripped the traffrail, unfazed by the increasing winds. Silver kept his back to it, facing instead the crew. The men were a fury of collective motion, a unit racing toward a common cause. There was no intention to brave the approaching tempest. Hell was the only thing awaiting them there.   
  
"She would have wanted this." Flint said softly. Silver's jaw clenched, his eyes burning with untethered rage as Flint figuratively poured salt on a festering wound.   
"Is that what you tell yourself?" Silver asked, a bitter smile cracking across his face. Sharp white teeth against tan weathered skin.   
Flint turned to him and Silver was forced to notice the agony reflected in those eyes. It tempered the fury inside him, but not enough. Madi was dead and Flint betrayed him. Stolen the cache and murdered his own crew for what Silver knew to be an all-consuming war. A war that had already cost so much.   
  
_Yet here he still stood_ , a traitorous whisper came from the back of his mind. He had his reasons. Flint may have betrayed him, destroyed their bond but Flint didn't consider it a betrayal. Silver had seen it in his eyes that day, it been as if Flint could almost see the possibility of victory through the dense forest. Not a victory of their current situation or even a battle to come in a year from now, but instead a victory that would shape the world, light up the crevices that the civilized world would label “dragons.” It wasn't- It wasn’t a true betrayal, but a new beginning in Flint’s eyes.

Possibility in Flint’s eyes. Hope in Flint’s eyes. Hell in Flint’s eyes.

Silver could recall stumbling into the bay where Woodes had kept Madi. Light streaming down from the ship openings, bathing the cargo bay in a hopeful golden glow. Madi’s still body leaned against one of the cases, stiff and unmoving. His mind tried to rectify what he saw, striving for a greater cause for which she had died for. He stiffened his shoulders, trying to prepare himself. Then suddenly, the body moved and he rushed to her. Falling to his knees, he pulled the body into his arms heedless of his aching leg, she was alive. His arms crushed around her and when he looked into her eyes he saw his hell reflected back, cold dead eyes. Sticky dark blood stained her lovely throat and she was cold. He jerked back, staggering to stand and his breath came out in ragged heaves, he was drowning. He pushed his way through the door, time seemed to lapse.

He was on deck.

Governor Woodes rested on his knees before Rackham.

There was a deafening blast of a gun and Woodes fell to the deck, bright scarlet blood splattered over the floor. Rackham’s shocked expression registered in his mind as he realized he was holding the gun. He objectively saw Rackham move toward him, bloody sword clasped in his hand, could hear Rackham screaming obscenities, but he didn’t move. Didn’t care. Flint seemed to materialize from nothing before him, blocking Rackham’s path with his own body.

 

Another Memory.

 

He sits in the Captain’s quarters. Night has fallen. Dead stars in an uncaring sky. Peace has been achieved between the pirates somehow, he didn’t remember how. Flint’s doing no doubt. The sound of a unoiled hinges alert him that someone has entered. Flint’s reflection distorted in the cracked mirror of the quarters. Violence blossoms within him, this was his fault. He rises from the chair. “I’m going to fucking kill you.” He lunges for Flint and Flint doesn't move. His fists move though, beating into Flint’s gut. Flint still doesn't move. He screams but it’s empty and they both know it. The scream dissolves into sobs, sobs into something far more pathetic and vulnerable. His leg gives out and Flint grips him, pulling him close to his chest.

_I’ve got you. I’ve got you._

The last words he hears before the world fades to black and the nightmares come. But he’s already in a nightmare.

 

Flint’s eyes stare at him now. He loathes him.

 

They’re blazing toward another battle, not the tempest that screams in horizon but the battle that arises in Williamsburg, to sack the city. Rackham’s ship is poised beside their’s. The idea of peace with the Guthrie’s a long expired reality to a different future.

 

“This revolution will change the world, change everything.”

 

He doesn’t care.

 

Flames surge around him, screams of the wounded a familiar caphcophy to his ears. He stands on the hull, watching the smoke rise, another victory for a cause that reminds him of his lost. Of the emptiness within himself. He descends into the Captain’s quarters and falls to the ground, pulling himself to the bed. He’s exhausted, the battle was a long and agonizing one but they prevailed. People now whisper of the unshakable force of the Maroons and the Pirates. Rackham and Flint declared fearless commanders of an inhuman force. Commanders for the Great Long John Silver. A smile flickers across his face as he catches his reflection in the same cracked mirror. Blood splatters smeared across his face and his legs trembling. _How great he is_.

“What happened?” Flint demanded. He hadn't even heard him enter. The Captain crossed the room determinedly and sat on the bed next to him, examining his arm that Silver belatedly realized had a jagged cut running across it. Producing a bottle of alcohol from a cabinet, the same man who just slaughtered a town of innocent people in the name of justice, gently dabs the wound. Silver just lets him, too tired to push him away. What do appearances matter with Flint anyway, he sees him for what he is. He knows Flint is staring with him, his arm is cleaned and bandaged perfectly; he has a war to run.

“Tell me what you need.” It’s as close to a command as anyone's dared for a while. Silver faintly recalls breaking someone’s nose when they’d had the audacity to question his second bottle of brandy. Memories of Madi scintillate through his mind, her radiant smile and unbreakable spirit as they basked in the paradise of her home. The tender kisses she would plant on his bare knuckles after he had stroked her cheek, murmuring how unbelievably beautiful she was. A tear trickles down his face and he forces himself to answer,

“I had what I needed.”

Flint simply stares at him. But he can’t bare to look back.


	2. Billy Bones

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is something I seriously WISH would have happened

Another memory flickers through Silver's mind, it has the same feel as the phantom pains that haunt his broken leg in the dead of night. Ceaseless and rancorous.

He takes a swig of bitter rum.

He remembers winking in and out of consciousness with the consistency of a candle in the wake of a breeze. Awaking hazily, sharp crimsons followed by clear blues, always combined with the ever-constant womb-like sensation of rocking. He's in the belly of a beast, the Walrus if memory yields right.  
Someone places a wet cloth over Silver's forehead and he jumps at the coldness of it.  
"Easy." A deep voice hums soothingly. He blindly tries to push himself up against the wall, reflexively trying to use his legs. His stump pushes against the rough fabric of the cot, the contact drawing a pathetic whimper from him.

"Hush, I've got you." A deep voice assures him and he feels massive bear hands sliding under his body, effortlessly pulling him to a warm chest.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Billy huffs out a deep breath, sitting back on the bucket, Silver encased by his thick arms. He gently cradles Silver's head against his shoulder, the normally silky curls slick with sweat.  
Fevered for three days now, in and out of consciousness.  
The first night of fever he had thrashed. _A demon slither in' him_ , or so the especially superstitious sailors whispered when they thought he couldn't hear.  
_Through the leg_ , they muttered over their steel crosses and twisted crows feet, _and into the soul_.  
Billy had held the delusional Silver down while the doctor cut more of the leg off, blood spurting over the smooth tan skin.  
His clear blue eyes had been wide open then, frantic as he screamed and writhed and sobbed.

The second day had been worse. He had just laid there and Billy could feel fear creeping into his own soul.  
Fear he wouldn't dare address.  
It was almost relief he felt when Silver abruptly broke stillness with frantic movements, desperately pawing at him to leave the cot.  
"I have to- I need to save them Billy. Christ, I need..."

The night had worn on, Silver's frenzied rambles the only sound beside the soft lapping of water against the hull. Billy would try to hold him down, pushing as hard as he dared, furious at Silver that he was forcing him to hurt him.

Almost by accident, Silver had thrashed enough that Billy had been forced to pull him into his arms to restrain him. And he had just stopped.

Head resting in the crook of Billy's neck, fingers digging into the muscled flesh of his arm as if to reassure himself that he was still there.

Out for three days now

He finds himself stroking the soft hair, gently untangling the knotted curls. He tells himself it's because he's bored, because Silver's the prettiest man on ship, because he hasn't fucked anyone since his own abuse at the hands of the English.

Billy's fucked other sailors before. There's a code. No looking each other in the eye. No talk. No kissing. Nothing but rapid thrusts in the cargo bay. Finnish and you never talk about it again, and neither does anyone else.

But he knows this is different. He's never cared about the scent of another man before. Earthy and alive with but a hint of some citrus oil Silver must use for his hair. He's certainly never studied the planes of another brother of the sea's face, smooth tan skin and almost feminine lips.

Never gently rubbed circles with his thumb against another man's thigh while whispering promises and plans for greatness.

Never tenderly kissed someone's forehead, resolving to do whatever it takes to ensure his future.

_Your future together._

 

_"You made your choice, live with it."_


End file.
